We knew we'd be buying when we had enough saved up so we looked around casually for about 2 years so that we really knew the areas we liked, where they were building new construction, what we wanted as far as new construction, or completed/lived in homes, etc.

When we really knew we wanted to buy, we put money down to build a house and the building took FOREVER. I think it was 7 months start to finish because it took a while for them to start building it.